The Pool in Bethesda — Paul John Hausleben

The quiet stranger in the black hat returns in an exciting new set of adventures! This time around, the stranger once more enlists allies to assist him in his quest to subdue evil and when despair hits and hope is almost lost forever, he intervenes, in order to change the course of people's lives for the better. This collection of two novellas, a novelette and a short story, capture the true essence of Paul John Hausleben's most mysterious character, however, this time around, the author provides the reader with subliminal clues as to the stranger's true identity.The first story, “680 Kilohertz” is a novella where crime and fantasy mix. An old radio and television repairman, nears the end of his career and his humdrum life of running his repair shop, becomes anything but humdrum when the quiet stranger in the black hat drops off an antique radio for repair. A radio, that not only broadcasts news and events from the future but also changes time when it does so. When the repairman hears a news broadcast of a horrific event broadcasted over the antique radio, the old repairman and a friend who is a police detective, are both caught in a tangled web of good versus evil and a heart racing mission to stop the horrific event in time.The second story is the novelette, “The Fig and the Thistle.” When the quiet stranger pays a visit to a corrupt and evil televangelist, to show him the error of his religious ways and to crumble the evil empire, the stranger does so with two missions in mind. Not only to destroy the corrupt religious empire, but more importantly, a little boy's life hangs in the balance. “Echo of a Requiem” is a short story about an elderly tailor--a proud and talented craftsman of custom men's business suits, who is down to his last gasps in life. Everything goes wrong for him. His wife passes away, he is laid off from his job, he is down to his last dollar and is forced to take a back-breaking job at a local supermarket. Hope seems lost until the old tailor shares an encounter with the stranger.“If Only for a Pause” is a novella of crime and fantasy mixed. Mark Holiday is a geeky, but brilliant video gamer with the gaming handle of, “Winterkill.” Mark also happens to be the world's greatest professional video gamer and the owner of a successful and lucrative video game empire. One night, when Mark decides to take a break from his introverted world of video games and venture into the real world, he encounters the mysterious stranger and meets a lovely young woman. Mark's life takes an incredible turn when the stranger gives, Mark, a remarkable gift. Mark receives the gift of a super power that enables him to pause the world for ten minutes. Just as he can in a video game. It is then that Mark realizes the stranger's gift is for Mark to assist him in his quest to defeat evil and Mark also realizes that it is to save the life of the woman, he loves.Once more, this remarkable collection of stories by the master storyteller, makes us wish that somehow, somewhere, the quiet stranger in the black hat really lurks in the shadows to bring hope and joy into our weary world.